1 . One of the cores of emotional intelligence is self-regulation, an important skill in the workplace. Like any skill, mastery of emotional self-control requires intentionality and practice.
Pause to Mentally Distance
When you notice your typical physiological experiences associated with strong negative emotion, what should you do? Mentally step out of your immediate experience. Asking yourself any question, or imagining what you might look like to others right now, will do the trick. At that point, although still physiologically keyed up, you will be able to ask yourself, “What is the best course of action right now?” or “What advice would I give someone else who is in my shoes?”
Take Control of Your Self-Talk
We’re frequently unaware of how much self-chatter is going on in the background of our minds. Such self-talk might not be in fully articulated (铰接式的) words or phrases, but instead little flashes of thought. Becoming aware of your self-talk can be difficult. Why is this an important skill to develop?
Seek Support from Partners
Ask others you trust to help you recognize when your emotions seem to be getting the best of you.
Cultivate (培养) Curiosity
Our brains are wired to draw conclusions and form judgments at lightning speed, and those are frequently the cause of our negative emotions.
| A．They are comfortable with all emotions |
| B．Those judgments are not necessarily accurate |
| C．Doing so provides you with choices as to how to act |
| D．Explain your developmental goals and sincerely ask for help |
| E．Stay focused on coming up with an answer and following through on it |
| F．Because it is those background beliefs that fuel our emotional responses |
| G．Here are four ways you can develop greater emotional self-management |
2 . Back in 1964, in his book Games People Play, psychiatrist Eric Berne described a pattern of conversation he called “Why Don’t You — Yes But”, which remains one of the most annoying aspects of everyday social life. The person adopting the strategy is usually a chronic complainer. Something is terrible about their relationship, job, or other situation, and they complain about it endlessly, but find some excuse to dismiss any solution that’s proposed. The reason, of course, is that on some level they don’t want a solution; they want to be validated (认可) in their position that the world is out to get them. If they can “win” the game — dismissing every suggestion until interlocutor (对话者) gives up in annoyance — they get to feel pleasurably righteous (正当的) in their anger and excused from any obligation to change.
Part of the trouble here is the so-called responsibility/fault fallacy (谬误). When you’re feeling hard done by — taken for granted by your partner, say, or obliged to work for a stupid boss — it’s easy to become attached to the position that it’s not your job to address the matter, and that doing so would be an admission of fault. But there’s a confusion here. For example, if I were to discover a newborn at my front door, it wouldn’t be my fault, but it most certainly would be my responsibility. There would be choices to make, and no possibility of avoiding them, since trying to ignore the matter would be a choice. The point is that what goes for the baby on the doorstep is true in all cases: even if the other person is 100% in the wrong, there’s nothing to be gained, long-term, from using this as a justification to evade responsibility.
Should you find yourself on the receiving end of this kind of complaining, there’s a clever way to shut it down — which is to agree with it. Psychotherapist Lori Gottlieb describes this as “over-validation”. For one thing, you’ll be spared further complaining, since the other person’s motivation was to confirm her beliefs, and now you’re confirming them. But for another, as Gottlieb notes, people confronted with over-validation often hear their complaints afresh and start arguing back. The concept that they’re utterly powerless suddenly seems unrealistic, not to mention rather annoying — so they’re prompted instead to generate ideas about how they might change things.
“And then, sometimes, something magical might happen, ” Gotlieb writes. The other person “might realize she’s not as trapped as you are saying she is, or as she feels. ” Avoiding responsibility feels comfortable, but turns out to be a prison; whereas assuming responsibility feels unpleasant, but ends up being freeing.
1. What is the characteristic of a chronic complainer, according to Eric Berne?| A．They are angry about their ill treatment and feel bitter towards whoever tries to help. |
| B．They are habitually unhappy and endlessly find fault with people around them. |
| C．They constantly dismiss others’ proposals while taking no responsibility for dealing with the problem. |
| D．They lack the basic skills required for successful conversations with others. |
| A．People tend to think that one should not be held responsible for others’ mistakes. |
| B．It is easy to become attached to the position of overlooking one’s own fault. |
| C．People are often at a loss when confronted with a number of choices. |
| D．A distinction should be drawn between responsibility and fault. |
| A．Stop them from going further by agreeing with them. |
| B．Listen to their complaints attentively and sympathetically. |
| C．Ask them to validate their beliefs with further evidence. |
| D．Persuade them to clarify the confusion they caused. |
| A．What is the responsibility/fault fallacy for chronic complainers? |
| B．How can you avoid dangerous traps in everyday social life? |
| C．Who are chronic complainers and how to deal with them? |
| D．Why should we stop being a chronic complainer and assume responsibility? |
3 . Perhaps you’ve stopped doing what you want because you’re afraid of what others think of you. You feel that you must do what they expect and that you must meet their expectations, otherwise you’ll lose their approval.
Think about yourself, about what you really like and are interested in. You must lead your life independently.
By surrounding yourself with people who think like you, you’ll realize that you don’t feel judged. Then, you’ll start doing what you really want.
To overcome your fear of what others think and of their non-approval, you should start talking about your plans, For instance, you might want to tell a handful of friends about your wishes and dreams.
It’s unavoidable that not everything will be plain sailing, and you’ll find obstacles along your way.
| A．There is no need to think about what you want. |
| B．You don’t have to change your circle of friends. |
| C．Your life belongs to you, as well as your actions. |
| D．By talking to them, you’ll be able to organize your plans and ideas. |
| E．If this is the case, it’s time to start working on your self-esteem (自尊). |
| F．You must do what you want without being affected by what others think. |
| G．However, you must trust in yourself and seek the necessary strength to move forward. |
I like staying overnight at my Gramma’s house — that is, until Gramma starts telling me how wonderful my cousin Maya is. Then it’s Maya this and Maya that until I don’t ever want to hear another word about her.
That’s why I wasn’t too excited when Gramma called me on the phone to “come on over and bring your pajamas.” When I got there, it was worse than I’d expected. There, in Grandpa’s big leather rocker, sat Maya, all dressed up and formal-looking and wearing fancy shoes as if she’d just been to a party.
“Surprise, Kristen!” Gramma said. “Your cousin Maya and her parents have traveled in from the East Coast on business. Maya gets to stay with us this afternoon.” Gramma chattered away about how excited she’d been for this surprise get-together, and how cousins ought to get to know each other better.
I hung my baseball cap in the closet and set my backpack by the stairway, all the time smiling and nodding as if I’d been waiting forever for this chance to spend an afternoon with Maya. Grandpa’s chair squawked (咯咯叫) as Maya rocked back and forth. It’s the chair I like best in the house, the one I usually sit in. I sat down on the sofa across from her.
Shortly, Gramma went off to the kitchen to “see about some lunch,” she’d said. That left me stuck in the living room with rocking Maya.
She was still small but taller than I’d remembered her from her last visit four years ago. She was good at small talk, though, and was chatting away about how nice it was to see me again. But I could tell that she didn’t really think so. The last time she was here, we’d had hours of fun together building caves out of Gramma’s sofa pillows.
After that, I’d heard about her only through Gramma’s tales. Maya taking piano lessons. Maya learning math. Maya, Maya, Maya. Now Maya was here, looking great with the latest haircut and a fancy dress.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Glancing down at my jeans and my old sneakers, I wished I hadn’t come.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“How do you know all these things about me?” I asked.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________5 . Have you ever bought a new car and started noticing the exact color and model of car everywhere? Has that type of car just become popular in your city? Were they there before? Or are you just going crazy?
You’re not going crazy. The reason you are now just noticing them is what psychologists call “priming”. Basically, the cars were always there. You just didn’t recognize them consciously. However, when that certain model of car becomes part of your conscious thinking, you start “automatically” recognizing all of the other cars that are the same, because you are already “primed” to do so.
The priming effect takes many forms. In one study, students were asked to walk around a room for 5 minutes at a rate of 30 steps per minute, which was about one-third their normal pace. After this brief experience, the participants were much quicker to recognize words related to old age, such as forgetful, old, and lonely. Reciprocal priming effects tend to produce a coherent reaction: if you are primed to think of old age, you would tend to act old, and acting old would reinforce the thought of old age. This research shows that the way we think influences the way we act, and the way we act influences the way we think.
A similar conclusion was reached by the American psychologist William James a century ago, but he emphasized the effect on feeling. “Actions seem to follow feeling, but really actions and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not. Thus the path to cheerfulness, should our cheerfulness be lost, is to sit up cheerfully and to act and speak as if cheerfulness were already there.”
So, that’s it. If you want to be happy, just sit up and act happy. Based on these scientific findings, we can adopt certain priming effects to help make ourselves consistently happier.
One thing we have in common is our ability to think, and thus feel. Pleasant thoughts have been proven to produce the chemicals that make us feel happy, particularly thoughts and feelings of gratitude. When we purposefully go through and think about the things we’re grateful for and deliberately feel as much gratitude as we can, we are flooding our mind with the “happy chemicals”. Furthermore, by consciously thinking, feeling and expressing gratitude, we will not only be happier in the moment, we will be “primed” to recognize the things in our life to appreciate. Each time this happens, the “happy chemicals” will be produced. Do this every day and we will become consistently happier. This makes up for the momentary happiness we gain from eating chocolate or buying new clothes. More than that, combining thoughts of gratitude with happy acts like smiling and laughing will have a supplementary positive effect on our state of mind.
1. Which of the following is an example of the priming effect?| A．Walking much faster after attending a lecture about old age. |
| B．Donating money to the poor after seeing pictures of cute cats. |
| C．Learning about various types of cars after purchasing the first car. |
| D．Completing SO_P as SOUP rather than SOAP after seeing the word EAT. |
| A．Related. | B．Two-way. | C．Well-rounded. | D．Opposite. |
| A．Eating or shopping leads to consistent feelings of happiness. |
| B．Our will has greater control over emotions than over actions. |
| C．Happy chemicals make us think about the things we’re grateful for. |
| D．Practicing gratitude frequently prepares us for long-term happiness. |
| A．Prime Yourself to Be Happier |
| B．Share Happiness to Enhance Wellbeing |
| C．Why Gratitude Is Important in Psychology |
| D．How Happy Chemicals Affect People’s Thoughts |
What my father wore embarrassed me! I wanted him to dress like a doctor or lawyer, but he always dressed like my father, getting up before dawn every day to make breakfast for my mother and me.
We lived in South Texas, where my father worked as a repairman. He often wore a pair of jeans and a shirt, keeping his pencils, glasses and wrenches (扳手) in his breast pocket. His boots were those with steel toes that made them difficult to pull off his feet, which I sometimes helped him with when he returned from repairing cars — his job that also shamed me.
I blamed the way he dressed. I felt that my classmates laughed at me because they’d seen him mowing lawns (修剪草坪) in cut-off jeans and black boots. My classmates’ families paid men to beautify their lawns, while their fathers travelled in the bay wearing lemon-yellow sweaters and expensive shoes.
He preferred clothes that allowed him the freedom to move under cars. So even when taking part in a school trip with me, he was dressed in his repairman’s suit. On the school bus to the campsite, all students on the bus happily chatted with their parents except me, who lowered the head, avoiding spotting my classmates’ mocking glance (讥笑的眼光) or hearing their jokes, which I thought was about nothing else but what my father wore.
I regretted telling my parents the school trip, and I was very angry why my mother had no spare time while my father happened to have a vacation. But my father failed to read my mind. He was very happy, whistling a tune along the way.
Though my father didn’t sense my bad mood, the school bus seemed as sad as I was. It drove more and more slowly and finally it stopped on the roadside. The driver got out to check the bus but found nothing wrong. Students and parents on the bus began to whisper about what was happening, worried that the delay might spoil the journey.
注意：1.续写词数应为150 左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卷的相应位置作答。
When others were complaining, my father stood up.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________The school bus restarted and everyone cheered.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________7 . Shyness is normal and it is not considered as a mental problem. All people have been shy at one time or another. Even the most confident people experienced being shy.
You probably are wondering why you are shy. It may be because of the environment you were used to or the way you were brought up. Certain events or incidents in the past may also lead to the reason why you are shy now.
One of the negative sides of being shy is having the tendency to be passive. Most of the time shy people can’t stand up for themselves and what they believe is right.
While shyness has negative aspects, it has positive sides. Shy people are usually good observers and do not get themselves into too much trouble because they try to observe their environment or any situation before they act.
| A．But in most cases, shyness proves to be genetic. |
| B．They are sensitive and accustomed to getting suspicious. |
| C．Because some people are born to be shy, they let it go hang. |
| D．So if you’re feeling shy, don’t worry because you are not alone. |
| E．They are not hot-headed and think twice before making any decisions. |
| F．Although shyness is something from birth, it can be improved over time. |
| G．They avoid crowds by nature and stay away from groups and social interactions. |
1. 历史人物的名字及其贡献；
2. 该人物对你的影响和启发；
3. 你对他（她）表达感谢。
注意：词数80词左右。
Dear ________,
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Thank you again, and best regards!
Yours,
Li Hua
When I was ten years old, I was a grade four primary school student in a small town. I had a happy time at school because I had a few good friends there. We usually spent our spare time together, doing our homework, going to the amusement park, playing with our pets, and sharing our happiness and sorrows together. But everything changed when my parents decided to change their jobs and moved to a bigger city. I even had no time to say good-bye to my old friends and teachers.
As I moved to the new city, I began my school life in a totally new school with new surroundings, new teachers and new classmates. During the first week, I felt lonely when I was at school. My classmates knew each other, but they didn’t know me, which added to my loneliness and sadness. That week day after day, I was sitting on my seat, pretending to be reading. How I secretly wished that someone would come to me and introduce himself to me or even play a trick on me, but disappointingly, nobody came.
Then one day, when my parents sent me to the bus station and said good bye to me, I didn’t get on the bus to school as usual. Instead, I walked and walked on the street, looking at the beautiful window displays and forgetting everything, with no worry about the new school, new teachers and new classmates. Then my empty stomach stopped me and I used my pocket money to have a bowl of noodles in a small restaurant. It was noon at the time, but still I didn’t want to go to school or go home. So I went to a park and sat on the bench, staring at the sky. And then I had a nap. When I woke up, I decided to go back to my hometown, where my former teachers and friends lived. So I went to the railway station. There I was stopped by a policeman, who asked for my ID card, which I didn’t have at the time. Then the policeman called someone and I was asked to stay with him.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
An hour later, I found my parents running towards me .
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The next day, when I was sent to school by my parents, I was afraid I would be punished.
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The telephone rang. Jack answered the call from his mother, “Mr. Richard died last night. The funeral is Wednesday.” Memories flashed through his mind like an old newsreel (新闻影片) as he sat quietly remembering his childhood days. It had been some time since Jack had seen the old man. College, career, and life itself got in the way. In fact, Jack moved across the country in pursuit of his dreams. There, in the rush of his busy life, Jack had little time to think about the past and often no time to spend with his wife and son.
“Jack, did you hear me?”
“Oh, sorry, Mom. Yes, I heard you. It’s been so long since I thought of him.” Jack said.
“Well, he didn’t forget you. Every time I saw him he’d ask how you were doing. He’d reminisced (追忆) about the many days you spent over ‘his side of the fence’ as he put it,” Mom told him.
After Jack’s father died, Mr. Richard stepped in to make sure Jack had a man’s influence in his life and it was Mr. Richard who taught Jack many things. Jack wouldn’t have been in this business if it hadn’t been for Mr. Richard.
Busy as he was, he returned home and attended the funeral, which was small and uneventful. Mr. Richard had no children of his own, and most of his relatives had passed away.
The night before Jack had to return home, he and his mother stopped by to see the old house next door one more time. Standing in the middle of the room, Jack paused for a moment. It was like crossing over into another dimension, a leap through space and time. The house was exactly as he remembered. Every step held memories. Every picture, every piece of furniture... Jack stopped suddenly.
“What’s wrong, Jack?” Mom asked.
“Where is the watch, the thing he valued most?” he seemed to ask himself.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题纸的相应位置作答。
“It was a gold pocket watch that he used to wear every day,” he told his mom.
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One day Jack received a package on his desk.
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